News Corp threatens to make Fox a subscription channel over startup streaming shows

Fox a subscription channel if Aereo keeps streaming shows: News Corp

News Corp.’s Fox network will go off the air and become a cable channel if U.S. courts don’t stop Internet startup Aereo Inc. from retransmitting shows like “The Simpsons” without permission, said Chief Operating Officer Chase Carey.

Fox and its affiliate stations would stop broadcasting and serve only pay-TV customers to protect the billions of dollars spent annually on programs, along with advertising revenue and hard-won fees from pay-TV systems, Carey told TV executives today in Las Vegas. A U.S. appeals court last week rejected broadcasters’ pleas to shut down Barry Diller’s Aereo.

We need to be able to be fairly compensated for our content

Carey is threatening to upend traditional broadcast TV to counter the peril posed by Aereo, a company backed by Diller, the former Fox network founder. If CBS, NBC and ABC follow, it would and mark an end to television as it’s been known since “The Honeymooners” aired in the 1950s. Fox and other networks are evaluating what to do next after the appeals court ruling.

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“We need to be able to be fairly compensated for our content,” Carey said. “This is not an ideal path we look to pursue, but we can’t sit idly by and let an entity steal our signal. We will move to a subscription model if that’s our only recourse.”

News Corp., controlled by Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Rupert Murdoch, rose 0.9% to US$30.90 at 1:37 p.m. in New York. The stock had climbed 20% this year as of April 5.